Temporary supports hold up portions of the new Skyway section of the Self-Anchored Bay Bridge, now under construction next to the old boxed steal frame Bridge. The new section waits for the new tower sections to be installed off Yerba Buena Island.

Photo: Lance Iversen, The Chronicle

Temporary supports hold up portions of the new Skyway section of...

Image 2 of 4

The new Skyway section of the Self-Anchored Bay Bridge, now under construction left stands next to the old boxed steal framed Bridge right. The new section waits for the new tower sections to be installed off Yerba Buena Island.

Photo: Lance Iversen, The Chronicle

The new Skyway section of the Self-Anchored Bay Bridge, now under...

Image 3 of 4

Teachers from the Lawrence Hall of Science take a boat tour under the new Skyway section of the Self-Anchored Bay Bridge, now under construction next to the old boxed steal framed Bridge off Yerba Buena Island in June.

Photo: Lance Iversen, The Chronicle

Teachers from the Lawrence Hall of Science take a boat tour under...

Image 4 of 4

Temporary supports hold up portions of the new Skyway section of the Self-Anchored Bay Bridge, now under construction next to the old boxed steal frame Bridge. The new section waits for the new tower sections to be installed off Yerba Buena Island.

With much fanfare and celebration - by Chinese steelworkers and Caltrans officials alike - the first steel pieces of the new Bay Bridge suspension span were prepared to ship out of Shanghai on Tuesday - more than a year late but in time to meet a Dec. 31 deadline that officials hope will keep construction on schedule for a 2013 opening.

"It's momentous," said Ken Terpstra, Caltrans' project manager for the Bay Bridge, from Shanghai where workers staged a ceremony complete with daytime fireworks. "It was a hard, challenging road, but they're ready to go."

The first shipment, delayed by welding problems, includes eight huge wing-shaped deck pieces that will hang over Yerba Buena Island. They're expected to arrive in the Bay Area in about four weeks, depending on weather and sea conditions. After clearing customs inspections and being unbolted from the ship transporting them, they'll be lifted atop the temporary trestle north of the existing bridge and rolled into place.

"This is really big," said Bart Ney, a Caltrans spokesman, who was also in China. "We're literally kicking off the new year with the start of construction of the suspension span."

The steel was originally scheduled for delivery in October 2008 but troubles with welds on the prefabricated steel deck pieces caused repeated delays while the problems were resolved. While construction of the new bridge has continued, the delays in the steel shipments have raised the possibility that the bridge opening could be pushed back beyond late 2013 and that the $6.3 billion budget, including an emergency reserve, could be exhausted.

Earlier this month, Bay Bridge officials announced a plan to offer bonuses and impose penalties to speed completion and delivery of the bridge's steel pieces. For every day that fabricator ZPMC missed Thursday's deadline for the first shipment, it faced a $300,000 penalty. But the firm is also being offered an incentive of $300,000 per day - up to $12 million - for each day before April 30 that the first pieces of the 525-foot steel tower departs Shanghai.

Bridge officials hope that once the initial delivery is made, it will be like breaking a logjam and the steel shipments will flow across the Pacific Ocean at regular intervals - about every other month - through 2011. The challenge now is to speed construction on the latter shipments of deck pieces.

"We're trying to see if we can streamline the process, if we can put more workers on the job, whatever we need to do," Ney said.

Several other segments of the new $1.8 billion suspension span have already been completed, or are well under way in Shanghai, Ney said, including the lower portions of the four-legged tower, which now stand - about 250 feet high - in the port on Changxing Island.

"The Golden Gate Bridge's days are numbered as the icon of the bay," Ney said. "Even in battleship gray (primer), it is amazing to look at."